The Fly Fishing Film Tour, affectionately known as the F3T by its growing base of diehard fans, returns to the Boulder Theater on March 27 — and I have a confession to make.

If you are a regular reader of my column, you may remember that I've devoted a story to the F3T for the past several years. I was thinking I might skip the Film Tour column for 2014, but, in the end, I just couldn't do it.

John's been fly fishing Labrador every chance he gets for a good many years now. I know it started with the lure of catching very large brook trout, but the real pull for John nowadays seems to be Labrador itself.

That's often the way it is with wild places, and obviously the big brookies don't hurt, either. Anyway, John said he thought the "movie" was pretty good. I knew then that I'd have to see it.

Just seeing "North of Wild," the title of the Labrador film, would have been enough to get me excited about the F3T this year, but an invitation to see the "tour" in Colorado Springs, where it's presented in conjunction with a fundraiser for Project Healing Waters, sealed the deal.

I couldn't think of a better way to enjoy the films and contribute to a worthy cause.

Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing (projecthealingwaters.org) is dedicated to the physical and emotional rehabilitation of disabled active military service personnel and disabled veterans through fly fishing and associated activities including education and outings. The programs offered by Project Healing Waters at locations throughout the country have and do make a difference every day and on every outing for its participants.

This year's film tour has the usual mix of saltwater, coldwater and warmwater fly fishing adventures, although it seems to tilt a little more than usual to trout, salmon and steelhead fishing. That's not to say there isn't plenty of saltwater fly fishing footage filmed in wonderful tropic locales just in case this year's particularly cold winter has got you down.

The selected films also have the mandatory allotment of smiling, screaming, inebriated and obviously happy fly fishers holding, hugging and kissing various fish species.

More than a few of those anglers are fly fishing guides taking a day off from work to actually fish themselves. Full time fly fishing guides, outfitters and fly shop owners typically make up a large contingent of the anglers featured in the tour's film selections. The guides project either a sense of quiet, in awe of the "resource," professional competence or a crazed, gonzo enthusiasm for the fish, the water and their job.

For the most part, the films don't deviate much from past years' reliance on pounding heavy music, fast moving 4-wheel-drive vehicles towing boats and hooked fish acrobatically getting "air" in time with the heavy music.

All of which has led me at past F3T shows to the old geezer conclusion that I'd be perfectly happy to watch the films with the sound turned off. But that would be a mistake for a couple of this year's films.

"Long Live The King" by Fly Out Media portrays the decline in Alaska's great King (Chinook) Salmon fishery, where returning numbers of fish have steadily been dropping.

The film crew interviews longtime guides, lodge owners, Native elders, political figures, conservation leaders and wilderness pioneers about the importance of the King Salmon to them personally and to Alaska not only as an economic resource, but also as a symbol of wild lands and Alaska.

The film's goal is to encourage the grassroots efforts in Alaska to defend its land, waters, cultural heritage and invaluable resources, including the King Salmon.

"Tributaries" by filmmaker R.C. Cone in his own words seeks "to uncover the commonality among different cultures, people and water. It explores the contrasting experiences of three diverse guides — a Bahamian flats-drifter, a Patagonian trout bum and a Viking blooded Icelander".

The film footage in "Tributaries" is spectacular and what the guides have to say is thoughtful. Prescott Smith, the Bahamian guide says, "The passion to me as it relates to fly fishing is how do we protect something so special that so many individuals benefit from who don't even fly fish... It's all connected. The rivers flush with new fresh water when the snow melts and so much tropical life in the saltwater is dependent on that snow fall."

The other guides voice similar insights about how all fly fishers are connected by the water. It's good stuff.

Lightning has 5A state title aspirations once againIt was the only home plate the Legacy varsity softball field had ever known, and there it was last Saturday, in its tattered state, dug out of the playing surface and relegated to a lonely, unused existence. Full Story

The Boulder alt-country band gives its EPs names such as Death and Resurrection, and its songs bear the mark of hard truths and sin. But the punk energy behind the playing, and the sense that it's all in good fun, make it OK to dance to a song like "Death." Full Story